This article argues that the decline of the ‘underclass’
discourse in the UK, and the rise of the ‘chav’, are not
unconnected. We contend that there are numerous homologies between the meaning
content, objects and tenor of these two terms, and suggest that the
‘chav’ represents a popular reconfiguration of the underclass
idea. However, we are also keen to note the way in which the concept of social
marginality is reconfigured in this substitution. Specifically, we argue that the
discourse of the underclass turned crucially upon a (perceived or real) pathology in
the working classes’ relations to production and socially
productive labour. Its emergent successor, the concept of the
‘chav’, is in contrast oriented to purportedly pathological
class dispositions in relation to the sphere of consumption. In a bid to
highlight this shift we consider the emergence of debates upon social marginality
and consumption practices, and attempt to locate popular media discourse surrounding
the ‘chav’ within this frame, including the various ways in
which purportedly pathological consumption practices serve to organise this form of
social classification.
Anderson, L.
and
M. Wadkins
(1992)
‘The New Breed in Japan: Consumer Culture’
, Canadian Journal of Administrative Studies9:
146-153
.
2.
Baudrillard, J. (1970) La société de
consommation. Paris: Gallimard.
3.
Baudrillard, J.
(1981) For a Critique of the Political Economy of the
Sign.
St Louis, MO: Telos Press
.
4.
Bauman, Z.
(1987) Legislators and Interpreters: On Modernity,
Post-modernity, and Intellectuals.
Cambridge: Polity
.
5.
Bauman, Z.
(1992) Intimations of Postmodernity.
London: Routledge
.
6.
Bauman, Z.
(1998) Work, Consumerism and the New Poor.
Buckingham: Open University Press
.
7.
Berger, P.L.
and
R.J. Neuhaus
(1977) To Empower People: The Role of Mediating Structures in
Public Policy.
Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute
for Public Policy Research
.
8.
Bok, L.
(2004) The Little Book of Chavs.
Cheam: Crombie Jardine
.
9.
Bourdieu, P.
(1984) Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of
Taste.
London: Routledge and Kegan Paul
.
10.
Bourgois, P.
(2003) In Search of Respect.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
.
11.
Buckingham, A.
(1996) ‘Statistical Update’,
in
R. Lister
(ed.) Charles Murray and the Underclass: The Developing Debate,
pp. 166-190.
London: IEA
.
12.
Burchill, J.
(2005)
‘Yeah but, No but, Why I’m Proud to Be a Chav’
, The Times2, 18 February.
13.
Campbell, C.
(1989) The Romantic Ethic and the Spirit of Modern
Consumerism.
London: Blackwell
.
14.
Chambliss, B.
(1991) ‘The Saints and the
Roughnecks’, in
J. Henslin
(ed.) Down-to-earth Sociology, pp. 271-286.
New York: The Free Press
.
15.
Cohen, A.
(1955) Delinquent Boys: The Culture of the Gang.
New York: Free Press
.
16.
Cohen, S.
(1972) Folk Devils and Moral Panics.
London: McGibbon
.
17.
Coleman, R.
(2005)
‘Surveillance in the City: Primary Definition and Urban Spatial Order’
, Crime, Media, Culture1(2):
131-148
.
18.
Corrigan, P.
(1976) ‘Doing Nothing’, in
S. Hall
and
A. Jefferson
(eds) Resistance Through Rituals: Youth Subcultures in Post-war
Britain, pp. 103-105.
London: Hutchinson
.
19.
Currie, E.
(1997)
‘Market, Crime and Community: Toward a Mid-range Theory of
Post-industrial Violence’
, Theoretical Criminology1(2):
147-172
.
20.
Dahrendorf, R.
(1985) Law and Order.
London: Stevens and Sons
.
21.
Dahrendorf, R.
(1987)
‘The Erosion of Citizenship and Its Consequences for All of Us’
, New Statesman, 12 June.
22.
Davis, M.
(1990) City of Quartz.
London: Verso
.
23.
Duncan, S.
,
R. Edwards
and
M. Song
(1999) ‘Social Threat or Social Problem? Media
Representations of Lone Parents and Policy Implications’, in
B. Franklin
(ed.) Social Policy, The Media and Misrepresentation.
London: Routledge
.
24.
Feathersone, M.
(1994) Consumer Culture and Postmodernity.
London: SAGE Publications
.
25.
Ferrell, J.
(2001) Tearing Down the Streets: Adventures in Urban
Anarchy.
New York: St Martins/Palgrave
.
26.
Field, F.
(1989) Losing out: The Emergence of Britain’s
Underclass.
London: Blackwell
.
27.
Field, F.
(1996) ‘Britain’s Underclass:
Countering the Growth’, in
R. Lister
(ed.) Charles Murray and the Underclass: The Developing Debate,
pp. 58-61.
London: IEA
.
28.
Finestone, H.
(1964) ‘Cats, Kicks and
Colour’, in
H. Becker
(ed.) The Other Side, pp. 281-297.
New York: The Free Press
.
29.
Fiske, J.
(1989) Reading the Popular.
Boston, MA: Unwin Hyman
.
30.
Golding, P.
(1999) ‘Thinking the Unthinkable: Welfare Reform
and the Media’, in
B. Franklin
(ed.) Social Policy, The Media and Misrepresentation, pp.
146-156.
London: Routledge
.
31.
Grover, C.
and
K. Soothill
(1996)
‘A Murderous “Underclass”? Press Reporting of
Sexually Motivated Murder’
, Sociological Review44(3):
398-415
.
32.
Hall, S.
(1997)
‘Visceral Cultures and Criminal Practices’
, Theoretical Criminology1(4):
453-478
.
33.
Hall, S.
and
S. Winlow
(2004) ‘“Barbarians at the
Gate”: Crime and Violence in the Breakdown of the Pseudo-pacification
Process’, in
J. Ferrell
,
K.J. Hayward
,
W. Morrison
and
M. Presdee
(eds) Cultural Criminology Unleashed, pp.
275-286.
London: GlassHouse Press
.
34.
Hayward, K.J.
(2004) City Limits: Crime, Consumer Culture and the Urban
Experience.
London: GlassHouse Press
.
35.
Hebdige, D.
(1979) Subculture: The Meaning of Style.
London: Methuen
.
36.
Herrnstein, R.J.
and
C. Murray
(1994) The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in
American Life.
New York: The Free Press
.
37.
Hoggart, R.
(1958) The Uses of Literacy.
Harmondsworth: Penguin
.
38.
Keyfitz, N.
(1992)
‘Consumerism and the New Poor’
, Society29(2):
42-48
.
39.
Kubrin, C.E.
(2005)
‘Gangstas, Thugs, and Hustlas: Identity and the Code of the
Street in Rap Music’
, Social Problems52(3):
360-378
.
40.
Larkin, K.
(2005)
‘Chavs Ban at Nightclub Cuts Crime’
, Stafford Express and Star, 25 February.
41.
Lasch, C.
(1979) The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in the Age of
Diminishing Expectations.
New York: W.W. Norton and Co
.
42.
Lawson, B.
(ed.) (1992) The Underclass Question.
Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press
.
43.
McKendrick, N.
,
J. Brewer
and
J.H. Plumb
(1982) The Birth of a Consumer Society: The Commercialization
of Eighteenth Century England.
London: Europa
.
44.
McLaughlin, E.
, (2005) ‘Recovering Blackness - Repudiating
Whiteness: The Daily Mail’s Construction of the Five White Suspects
Accused of the Racist Murder of Stephen Lawrence’, in
K. Murji
and
J. Solomos
(eds) Racialization: Studies in Theory and Practice, pp.
163-184.
Oxford: Oxford University Press
.
45.
Madeley, G.
(2003)
‘Casual Elegance Leads to Burberry Bans in City Pubs’
, Daily Mail, 14 November.
46.
Mayhew, H.
(1851-62) London Labour and the London Poor.
London: Cass
.
47.
Merton, R.K.
(1938)
‘Social Structure and Anomie’
, American Sociological Review3:
672-682
.
48.
Miller, J.
(1995) ‘Struggles over the Symbolic: Gang Style
and the Meanings of Social Control’, in
J. Ferrell
and
C.R. Sanders
(eds) Cultural Criminology, pp. 213-234.
Boston, MA: Northeastern University Press
.
49.
Morris, L.
(1994) Dangerous Classes: Underclass and Social
Citizenship.
London: Routledge
.
50.
Murray, C.
(1984) Losing Ground.
New York: Basic Books
.
51.
Murray, C.
(1990) The Emerging British Underclass.
London: IEA Health and Welfare Unit
.
52.
Murray, C.
(2001)
‘The British Underclass: Ten Years Later’
, The Public InterestFall:
25-37
.
53.
Nightingale, C.
(1993) On the Edge.
New York: Basic Books
.
54.
Pearson, G.
(1975) The Deviant Imagination: Psychiatry, Social Work and
Change.
London: Macmillan Press
.
55.
Presdee, M.
(1994) ‘Young People, Culture and the
Construction of Crime’, in
G. Barak
(ed.) Varieties of Criminology: Readings From a Dynamic
Discipline, pp. 179-187.
Westport, CT: Praeger
.
Roberts, R.
(1971) The Classic Slum.
Manchester: Manchester University Press
.
59.
Schwartz, B.
(1999)
‘Capitalism, the Market, the “Underclass”,
and the Future’
, Society, November/December:
33-43
.
60.
Southerton, D.
(2002)
‘Boundaries of “Us” and
“Them”: Class, Mobility and Identification in a New Town’
, Sociology36(1):
171-193
.
61.
Stedman-Jones, G.S.
(1971) Outcast London.
Oxford: Oxford University Press
.
62.
Taylor, I.
(2000) Crime in Context: A Critical Criminology of Market
Societies.
Cambridge: Polity
.
63.
Veblen, T.
(1925) The Theory of the Leisure Class.
London: Allen & Unwin
.
64.
Vigil, J.D.
(1988) Barrio Gangs: Street Life and Identity in Southern
California.
Austin, TX: Texas University Press
.
65.
Wilson, J.Q.
(1985) Thinking About Crime.
New York: Vintage Books
.
66.
Wilson, W.J.
(1987) The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the
Underclass and Public Policy.
Chicago: Chicago University Press
.
67.
Wilson, W.J.
(1996) When Work Disappears: The World of the New Urban
Poor.
New York: Vintage Books
.
68.
Winnett, R.
(2005)
‘Meet the “NEETS”: A New Underclass’
, Sunday Times, 27 March.
69.
Young, J.
(1999) The Exclusive Society.
London: SAGE Publications
.
70.
Young, J.
(2002) ‘Crime and Social
Exclusion’, in
M. Maguire
,
R. Morgan
and
R. Reiner
(eds) The Oxford Handbook of Criminology.
Oxford: Oxford University Press
.
71.
Young, J.
(2003)
‘Merton with Energy, Katz with Structure: The Sociology of
Vindictiveness and the Criminology of Transgression’
, Theoretical Criminology7(3):
389-414
.
